none exactly like another

crystalline and beautiful

some clumped, piled and solid

frozen

collective

others discrete and vanishing

transient

alone

unique in source

formed by their passage

by environment

by others of their kind

evolutionary

some pure

some polluted

some noted

acclaimed

others solitary fall

melt before maturity

lost

oft looked for

beckoned hither

sought after

illusive

dreaded inundation

drifts

isolating

smothering

oft mourned

debilitating

I'm not sure I exist in 'blog form anymore, but I felt obliged to post my annual array of pictures from the previous year.  It was a good year, even if the pictures don't tell the full story.  From experiencing my first Ottawa winter, to Hawaii in March, random travels in June and July and a few weddings, 2008 was full of new adventures, seemingly repeated experiences and some new revelations about myself; always appreciated and sometimes uncomfortable. 

If you're looking for specifics on the photos, click here.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

Pictures from September: In no particular order, the beginning of a semester in Ottawa.  Trips out of town, snapshots of town.  Cooking class, etiquette training and, oh yes, The Man.  Somewhat inadvertently the only picture in colour, but somehow seemingly appropriate in its contrast to "real life."  The election on both sides of the border seems to consume and overshadow everything else in such a political town/program, yet it doesn't take much to strip away the facade and see how two dimensional and colourless it is when contrasted with the vibrancy of life.